Three things for the first day of Autumn

[nwhiker]

1. I really think Autumn is my favorite season. I love Winter and Spring and absolutely despise Summer, but somehow, the clear, crisp days of Fall always speak to me. I love hiking in the fall as well, though it doesn't look like we'll be doing much of that because....

2. My sister's remodel was late and going to be even later. At this point, it looks like she won't be ready to take my mom until early next year. I don't know how we're going to manage; this house is just not set up for an extra person who doesn't spend time like the rest of us... I mean, we're all able to sit in the same room and give each other our own space... my mom chatters, hums, and is otherwise... disruptive, putting stress on all of us. Noise cancelling headphones work, but she just talks longer and louder, so NSM. To be fully honest. Had I know it was going to be for this long, I would have argued harder for memory care, something my sister wanted to delay. Days like yesterday, which was gruesome and started at around 3am when my mom marched upstairs to the living area, turned on all the lights, all the while shouting that here she was, mom/hanna, and wouldn't go back to bed. Then woke up a few hours later with some serious delusions, left the house to look for "her children", and was distressed all day because "her children" didn't come home. It's... hard.

3. Dh is still testing positive, sigh. House still wide open, I'm still sleeping in the living room, dh, Perry, and I continue to mask. It looks, at this point, like Perry and I managed to dodge this bullet, not quite sure how.

Comments

[camelsamba]

how many days since he tested positive? i was under the impression that one could still test positive for weeks after you are no longer capable of transmitting it. But hey, you're the microbiologist, not me! The CDC guidelines have you isolate for only 6 days if your symptoms are improving and you're med-free fever-free for 24 hours. When I asked the volunteer coordinator at a place I go weekly, he said "we ask that you be 24 hours w/o fever and all symptoms improving."

[nwhiker]

He started testing 5 days after he started feeling cruddy, hoping to catch a negative as soon as it happened, since you're supposed to get two negatives 48 hours apart and this whole house open stuff is really starting to get chilly.

The testing negative for months is usually via PCR. PCR tests for the actual virus, which is more than happy to hang out, even if it can't go into full replication mode, in your nose etc. The antigen tests have crappy-ish sensitivity (ie a negative test may not be negative...) and test for proteins on the surface of the virus and for some reason, are often negative before PCR (probably because PCR amplifies the nucleic acids, LOL, that's kinda it's whole purpose.)

He's feeling a bit better today, and coughing a lot less, which is good. My mom seems to be 100% recovered. Neither has had a fever for a few days.

I think that if we'd all gotten sick it would have been easier, but since Perry and I did not, and neither of is really eager to, we're applying max precautions, ya know?

We shall see what tomorrow's test brings.

[camelsamba]

and re: delaying the memory care: sometimes it takes a different set of eyes to see what is going on. Your sister might have gotten used to the behavior gradually over time, and thus not realized how extreme it was. I'm sorry it's so stressful for you - definitely a hard situation.

[nwhiker]

My sister also hasn't spent more than a few days with her for about a year now, and I think things have gotten worse. Especially the days with delusions. She's more distressed by them and less able to be talked out of them.

We shall see.

It's just hard. My house is just not set up for this.

I'll figure it out. I think the hardest thing is that my mom was possibly one of the smartest people I'd ever met. And seeing her function at toddler level (with the vocabulary of a college student, LOL) is just so fucking hard.